Tag Archives: Dogs

Fire on the Mountain

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Fire on the Mountain

The smell of burning leaves us only when we sleep,
the hills above us aflame for weeks as the wind
catches the upraised hands of a dozen fires
and hurries them here and there.

It is like this every year
at the end of summer,
with the dry grass ignited by
light reflected by a piece of glass
or careless farmers burning off their fields.

The lushness of the rainy season
long since turned to fodder by the sun,
the fires burn for weeks along the ridges
and the hollows of the Sierra Madre—
raising her skirts from where we humans
puddle at her ankles.

Imprisoned in their separate worlds,
the village dogs bark
as though if freed
they’d catch the flames
or give chase at least.

The distracting smell of roasting meat
hints at some neighborhood barbecue,
but only afterwards do we find
the cow caught by her horns in the fence
and roasted live.

Still, that smell of roasting meat
pushes fingers through the smoke of coyote brush
and piñon pines and sage,
driving the dogs to frenzy.

The new young gardener’s
ancient heap of rusting Honda
chugs up the hill like the rhythm section
of this neighborhood banda group
with its smoke machine gone crazy
and its light show far above.

The eerie woodwinds
of canine voices far below
circle like children
waiting for their birthday cake,
ringing ‘round the rosy,
ringing ‘round the rosy
as ashes, ashes,
it all falls down.

I discovered a new prompting site. The prompt for this poem was to write down the following, then to use all six in a poem that begins with “The smell of burning leaves….” (I had a different take on that first line.)

Something you buy in a bakery. (Birthday cake)
A smell in a diner. (Roast beef)
A make of automobile. (Honda)
Something people do to relieve stress. (Sleep)
An unusual musical instrument. (Quena flute. I felt the actual name of the instrument distracted from the poem, so I used the more generic “woodwind.”)
A child’s game. (Ring around the Rosy)

Here is the link for that site if you want to follow the prompt or see other poems written to this prompt.

Autumn Schmautumn

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The Prompt: Autumn Leaves—Changing colors, dropping temperatures, pumpkin spice lattes: do these mainstays of Fall fill your heart with warmth — or with dread?

Autumn Schmautumn

The only colored leaves I see are going to be faux,
for autumn never visits in my part of Mexico.
In fact, those piles of autumn leaves are far back in my past.
Green on the leaves in Mexico just lasts and lasts and lasts.
It’s true that each leaf everywhere must one day be defeated,
but down here where I live, the only way leaves are unseated
is not by frigid temperatures. There’s no cold to unglue them.
Our only leaf-removal means is cutter ants that chew them!
The ones who cut them down are all the bravest and the best.
Their comrades wait below to carry them all to their nest.
Their robberies completed without the slightest peep,
their piles of leaves depleted in the nighttime while we sleep.
Our guard dogs doze on soundly as ants pass by in the dark,
letting all these thieveries go on without one bark.
And so I fear that this far south no autumn colors are viewed.
Our trees create no spectacle. They go from green to nude!
And though ants harvest all our leaves—just chew them off and take them,
at least they grant us favors in that we don’t have to rake them!

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“You Don’t Send Me Flowers Anymore”

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The Prompt: Secret Admirers—You return home to discover a huge flower bouquet waiting for you, no card attached. Who is it from, and why did they send it to you?

No Roses Left Inside my Gate

He didn’t leave me flowers, instead he sent a cake.
Not the smartest choice that he will ever make.
The problem was, he left it inside my compound door
where the dogs could get it.  Now it is no more!
My dogs have diarrhea and I have no dessert.
Little bits of cardboard are carpeting the dirt
and grass and bricks and tiles and every patio chair—
with every bit of frosting licked from them with care.
I cannot blame my friend for this ungodly mess.
The blame is only mine, I’m driven to confess.
My friend’s a loyal reader and I’m a foolish girl.
You’ll understand more clearly if you read this URL:
https://grieflessons.wordpress.com/2014/07/17/popsicles-and-tuberoses/

Justification

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Justification

I spent all day in town today for business and for pleasure,
so by the time I got back home, I felt I’d had full measure
of driving-selling-trying on, shopping-eating-walking;
so I just thought I’d have some time that didn’t include talking.
I put my suit on thinking I would jump right in the pool,
but then the cat began to whine, the dogs commenced to drool—
sure signals it was feeding time—in this they were united.
They’ve learned their human serves their supper faster when invited.

The problem was, the dog food was still up in the car,
so I ran out to get it. (It wasn’t very far.)
I fed the dogs and cat, then found new flea collars I’d bought,
and so, of course, I had to put new collars on the lot.
Then, finally, the pool was mine—aerobic exercise
kept my body busy while a movie wooed my eyes
to disregard the time that passed while bending, kicking, flopping,
for when I am distracted, I am less intent on stopping.

With no prompt to finish early, I just went on and on.
Two hours passed so quickly that the setting of the sun
(and the ending of the movie—I guess I must admit)
finally gave the signal that it was time to quit.
But as I climbed the ladder, something poked my breast—
something sharp and lumpy that had made a little nest
there between my cleavage all my hours in the pool;
and when I drew it out you can’t image what a fool

I felt like, for this faux pas cannot help but win the prize
of all the times that I’ve done stupid things in any guise.
As teacher, daughter, writer, artist, sister, lover, friend,
I’ve committed stupid acts impossible to mend.
But this one takes the cake, I’m sure, as stupidest by far.
I’ve told you how I went to get the pet food from the car,
then fed and put flea collars on protesting dogs and cat.
(I doubt you’d do much better when dealing with all that!)

When I went out to do all this, I didn’t want to lose ‘em.
That’s why my car keys (with remote) wound up within my bosom!


Try as we may, those little indicators of age will sneak up on us.  There is no plastic surgery for a sagging memory!!!  (The Prompt today was:  “Age is just a number,” says the well-worn adage. But is it a number you care about, or one you tend (or try) to ignore?”)

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Wonder of wonders, when I put the key in the ignition the next morning, it worked!!! Saved on this one!

The Dogs Are Barking (May 19,2013)

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The Dogs Are Barking

They break the morning––a daily rite.
It’s just a warning. The dogs won’t bite.
Two strangers talk but pass unseen.
I doze, they walk, with a wall between.
I lie here posed between thought and sleep.
My eyes still closed. I’m swimming deep.

I resist the trip––that journey up––
preferring to sip from the dreaming cup
whose liquid darker and bitter thick
reveals a starker bailiwick
than schedules, crafts, menus, schemes.
Much finer draughts we quaff in dreams.

I try to sink back into sleep,
once more to drink of waters deep;
but the dogs still bark. They leap and pace.
My dreams too dark for this morning place.
Those dreams lie deep and intertwined,
wanting to creep back up my mind.

But its slippery slope is much inclined
and provides small hope that I will find
again, that world well out of sight
where truth lies curled, still holding tight––
as oysters cleave and then unfurl
with mighty heave, the priceless pearl

of that other mind that slips the knife
beneath the rind of our daily life.
Time is a brew of present, past
and future, too—whatever’s cast
to stew and steep the story rare
that’s buried deep in dreams laid bare.

Dreams are stories we tell ourselves
that draw our quarries to bookstore shelves.
Pinned to the page, they reach their height
and bring our sage self to the light.
But the dogs are barking. They’re hungry, cross.
When I rise to feed them, the poem is lost.

Uncaught, dismembered, it blows away.
Like petals, scattered in the light of day.